


Slytherins Need Not Apply

by Kingknome



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: Discrimination, Gen, Good Slytherins, POV Second Person, Reader-Insert, Slytherins Being Slytherins, job searching
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-12
Updated: 2018-03-12
Packaged: 2019-03-30 08:13:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 720
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13947450
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kingknome/pseuds/Kingknome
Summary: The notice in the window pane was small but clear "HELP WANTED, GOOD WITH SIZING/EXPANSION CHARMS, SLYTHERINS NEED NOT APPLY."





	Slytherins Need Not Apply

The first time you saw it posted, you scoffed. Who would want to work at a dump like that anyway? You certainly, were headed on to better things. You read the Daily Prophet well, daily, always skipping to the employment section. Dragon trainers, charms work, grocer, potions suppliers, magical retail, magical renovation, ward workers and breakers, the possibilities go on and on, and you're fresh out of Hogwarts. Surely there must be something that needs a clever mind.

You aim high, sending owls with applications by the dozen, even to places where you haven't got a chance. The responses trickle back, just a few mostly polite standard rejections. Then you get one that smulders and leaks stinky smoke, and when it opens itself, your application falls out and bursts into flame. Left behind is a pile of ash that reads "slytherins need not apply".

After that you are a little more careful, a little more jaded. You begin to notice "snna" and "sNa" worked into the adds of the daily prophet. Sometimes you send an application anyway, carefully leaving your house affiliation blank. Twice you get an interview, both times scornfully turned away as soon as they pop the question. Desperately you turn to your school mates, but the answers are negative. "If you want a job," advises a former Prefect, "try Spain, or France. I hear Greece is nice this time of year." England is your home though, and your cannot bear to leave (you cannot afford to leave either).

You begin to get desperate, applying for anything and everything, even if you are overqualified. You need to eat, and you can't afford to live like this much longer. The jobs that finally respond positively, are horrible. You don't particularly want to work with hags or squibs, but if that's what pays the bills, you'll take it. At least until till you can find something else. Soon you're working three terrible part time jobs, and you're too tired to even look at the Prophet anymore.

Then one day, you venture out for a rare treat at Fortescue's and pick up an abandoned paper. The front page declares "MUGGLEBORN SEEKS ANTI-DISCRIMINATION LAWS FOR WEREWOLVES; CENTARS; GOBLINS; OTHERS" The article is full of unfair hiring and service practices as described by various magical peoples.There are many quotes from the muggleborn that you don't quite understand, but the essence speaks to you. You notice one specific group missing.

"To Ms. Hermione Granger;" your begin; the letter that takes your the better part of an hour to compose. You explain the trials that these first few years from Hogwarts have put you through, and ask her for clarification on several parts of the article. Two days later you receive an overburdened owl, loaded down with muggle books, and pamphlets from **S.M.U.R.F.** (Society for Magical Unity, Respect, and Fairness). You read through the materials eagerly, and write back with more questions, and receive very few answers, but it doesn't matter. Ms. Granger ("Call me Hermione!") has just as many questions for you. Eventually you are able to quit one of your terrible jobs, and then another, and you're fired from the third but it's okay. You're slumming it on a sofa (it's _Harry Potter's_ sofa), but the work you are doing is important.

You go out and talk to people every day, and more importantly you listen to them. You ask them what they need, and why they can't get it, and then you and Hermione try to figure out what can be done. Often it's just more articles in the Quibbler or more and more often, the Prophet; but sometimes it's more. Sometimes you babysit while parents take wolfsbane, sometimes you donate blood for vampires, sometimes you escort free elves to work. Sometimes you picket in Diagon Alley, letting people know what shops discriminate against Veelas. Sometimes you find a fight, and sometimes the fight comes to you.

One day, years later, you open the prophet, and skip to the employment section. You scan the adds, and are proud to note that colourful euphemisms like "NoWeres" "no haffies" and "daylight only" are missing. And nowhere in years, have you seen anyone post "slytherins need not apply". After all, who would want to offend Hermione Granger's Deputy Prime Minister?

**Author's Note:**

> I just remembered Fortescue is dead, so IDK, someone else runs it now.  
> I tried to base a bit of this on the Black Panthers/Brown Berets of my mom's youth. They would feed her and her siblings breakfast, and walk them to school. They helped my family out a lot.


End file.
